Romantic Landscape Painting

History
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Portraiture
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Genre
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Landscape
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Still Life
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The Hierarchy of Genres
Heroic subjects; larger size; Grand
Manner style
Important people; size determined
by status
Poor people and everyday life;
smaller scale, and realistic size
The Academic Hierarchy of Genres had placed landscape painting low in its scale of values, but
landscape painting took on increasing prominence and prestige in the Romantic period

Romantic poets turned to nature as a source of inspiration, and as a way to free
themselves from the corrupting influences of civilization -- and Romantic
painters similarly turned to nature as a vehicle of self discovery and redemption

Carl Julius von Leypold, Wanderer in the Storm, 1835
Metropolitan Museum
Romantic landscapes are typically “moody” in atmosphere

Carl Julius von Leypold, Wanderer in the Storm, 1835
Metropolitan Museum
They are more about the subjective feelings of the artist, than an objective
record of the observable world

Horace Vernet, Stormy Coast Scene after a Shipwreck
Metropolitan Museum
Storms, shipwrecks, and the
mysterious light of dusk and
dawn were popular themes

Horace Vernet, Stormy Coast Scene after a Shipwreck
Metropolitan Museum
“In Romantic art, nature—with its uncontrollable power, unpredictability,
and potential for cataclysmic extremes—offered an alternative to the
ordered world of Enlightenment thought.”
Galitz, Kathryn Calley. “Romanticism”. In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art
History

John Constable, Wivenhoe Park, Essex, 1816
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Landscape paintings of the Romantic period generally fall into three categories: the Pastoral, the
Picturesque, and the Sublime

The pastoral landscape refers to “inhabited” landscape: placid scenes of well tended farms, that
represent a reassuring view of human control of nature

This painting by John Constable of a family estate located outside London is a perfect example of
the Pastoral

“It is easy to imagine oneself on this quiet summer afternoon . . . . All is placid and in place—
contented cows graze or snooze, fishermen drag their nets in the pond, and a kitchen garden and
domestic animals occupy the space beyond the trees on the right—features typical of the self-
sustaining nature of such a country estate.”
National Gallery of Art, DC

Thomas Cole, View of the Catskill, Early Autumn, 1836-7
Metropolitan Museum of Art
The “picturesque” refers to the beauty of nature unspoiled by human intervention

In the 18th century, people began to appreciate what we now call “scenic” spots: charming
views of mountains or streams, a sunrise or sunset, or simply watching wild life in their natural
habitat

If you have ever driven on a road and seen signs for a look out point, where you are likely to get
a good photograph, that is a “picturesque” spot!

Ironically, this appreciation for the “picturesque” emerged in the context of the Industrial
Revolution, when “unspoiled” nature was under threat of extinction

This painting by Thomas Cole depicts a view of the Catskill Mountains from near his home in
Catskill New York

By the time the picture was painted, the view no longer looked like this

“The Canajoharie and Catskill Railroad was being constructed through its heart, dooming
hundreds of trees. Cole, who was also a poet and an essayist, wrote in despair of the ruthless
sacrifice. In the painting, the misty distant mountains, the calm light on the water, and the
pastoral figures in the foreground constitute a scene that he mourned as lost forever.”
Metropolitan Museum

Albert Bierstadt, Storm in the Mountains, c.1870
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
The third type of landscape is called the Sublime

In a famous treatise on the nature of the “Beautiful” and the “Sublime,” the 18th century
philosopher Edmund Burke defined the Sublime as the sensation produced when we are
confronted with beauty in its most terrible form

“Sublime images . . . show Nature at its most fearsome . . . Burke believed that “terror is
in all cases… the ruling principle of the sublime.” There is an awe and reverence for the
wild that to Burke was akin to violent passion. Humanity is small and impotent in front of
raging rivers, dizzying cliffs and canyons, ferocious animals, and violent storms. These
works can also be uplifting, but in a deeply spiritual way. The Sublime emphasizes God’s
dominion over humanity and considers the possible folly in mankind’s overriding
confidence.”
University of Arizona Museum of Art

This is the kind of landscape that gives you goose bumps, and makes your heart race
(think of huge mountains, tumultuous seas, powerful storms, or erupting volcanoes)

For thrill-seekers (like me, seen here in Bear Lakes Basin in the Sierras), this is the ultimate
nature experience –and Romantic landscape painters became the “extreme-sport” thrill-
seekers of their day, seeking out remote locations where they could capture nature in all of
its sublime grandeur

Caspar David Friedrich, The Wanderer
above the Mists, 1817-18
Kunsthalle, Hamburg
One of the leading Romantic landscape painters was the German painter Caspar David
Friedrich, whose work is often related to the 18th century concept of the Sublime — the
sensation we experience when confronted with the boundlessness of nature, or the
immeasurable power of natural forces

Kunsthalle, Hamburg
The Sublime evokes feelings of terror and wonder because it allows our mind to glimpse the
infinite, or powers much larger than us

Kunsthalle, Hamburg
In this painting we see a solitary individual (possibly the artist), gazing out over an awe-
inspiring and terrifying natural landscape

Kunsthalle, Hamburg
The viewer is invited to see the scene through the eyes of the wanderer, and to experience
for ourselves the transformative experience he is having

Kunsthalle, Hamburg
The stunning landscape is thrilling in its beauty, but it is also terrifying – reminding us of our
frailty and insignificance in the larger scheme of things

Thomas Cole, Distant View of Niagara Falls, 1830
Art Institute of Chicago
The American Hudson River School was also influenced by the Sublime

Founded by the American painter Thomas Cole, the Hudson River School focused on the
awe-inspiring magnificence of the American landscape, as seen in this painting of Niagara
Falls

However, Cole has altered the scene to reflect his Romantic ideal of nature untouched by
civilization

“The painting bears little resemblance to the landscape surrounding the falls at
the time, which was marked by factories, scenic overlooks, and hotels that
accommodated the multitude of tourists that visited every year. Instead of
realistically representing this scene, Cole presented a romanticized view of
Niagara Falls that mourns the vanishing American wilderness.”

Thomas Cole, The Oxbow (View from Mt. Holyoke, Massachusetts, after a Thunderstorm), 1836
Metropolitan Museum
This painting by Thomas Cole depicts a sharp curve in the Connecticut River near Mount
Holyoke, Massachusetts

The painter is depicted in the foreground, a tiny
speck overwhelmed by the vast forces of nature

Metropolitan Museum
The left hand portion of the painting shows a dense forest under stormy skies, symbolizing
the wilderness

Metropolitan Museum
The right hand portion depicts cultivated fields under a sunlit sky, symbolizing civilization

Thomas Cole, Installation diagram for the Course of Empire, 1833
Between 1833 – 1836 Cole worked on an epic series of paintings titled The Course of
Empire, which illustrated his belief about the cyclical nature of social progress

Thomas Cole, The Savage State, from The Course of Empire, 1834
The series begins with The Savage State – a primitive landscape inhabited by hunters,
resembling Native American Indians

It is an ideal world, in which human inhabitants live harmoniously with nature

Thomas Cole, The Arcadian or Pastoral State State, from The Course of Empire, 1834
The second scene depicts The Arcadian or Pastoral State

The same craggy mountain can be seen in this scene, but the wilderness has given way to
plowed fields and pastures, while a Stonehenge-like temple can be seen on hillside in the
middle distance

The scene remains peaceful and idyllic, as humans continue to live in harmony with nature

Thomas Cole, The Consummation of Empire, from The Course of Empire, 1836
In the third scene, the natural world has been completely dominated by human expansion

Thomas Cole, The Consummation of Empire, from The Course of Empire, 1836
Modeled on the architecture of ancient Rome, Cole does not look to this moment as a grand
climax in the progress of civilization, but rather as a period of decadence that will soon lead
to its own undoing

Thomas Cole, Destruction, from The Course of Empire, 1836
In the next scene we witness the inevitable destruction of civilization

Thomas Cole, Desolation, from The Course of Empire, 1836
And in the final scene, we see the ruins of a lost and forgotten civilization, as the wilderness
begins to reclaim its rightful place

John Constable, The Haywain, 1821
National Gallery, London
In England, the leading landscape painter was John Constable

He painted scenes of the countryside near his boyhood home in Suffolk

The Haywain depicts a placid country scene, with a small cottage to the left, and two men
leading a horse cart across a stream – a quintessential Pastoral theme

Constable’s landscapes were painted when the industrial revolution was transforming the
English countryside – making them a nostalgic representation of a rapidly disappearing way
of life

J.M.W. Turner, Rain, Steam, and Speed, 1844
Constable’s contemporary, Joseph Mallord William Turner, also responded to the impact of
rapid modernization in the 19th century

J.M.W. Turner, Rain, Steam, and Speed – The Great Western Railway, 1844
This picture depicts a locomotive crossing the Maidenhead railway bridge, which had been
completed just 5 years before the picture

The bridge cuts a diagonal across the canvas, as the locomotive surges forward, cutting
through the fog and rain with unstoppable force

Just as the rain storm dissolves the solid forms of the urban surroundings, the speed of the
locomotive renders the iron-clad engine a substanceless blur, as ephemeral as a wisp of air

Turner’s style at this late stage of his career had become sketchy and impressionistic,
focusing on effects of light and atmosphere, rather than solid forms

One of his patrons complained that he painted “as if his brains and imagination were mixed
upon his palette with soapsuds and lather”

But the style anticipated both Impressionism, and later experiments with abstraction

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Slave Ship (Slavers Throwing Overboard the Dead and Dying, Typhoon
Coming On), 1840
Museum of Fine Arts Boston
This painting was based on an account of the captain of a slave ship who threw his sick and
dying slaves overboard in a storm, because his insurance only covered slaves lost at sea, and
not those who died of other causes

As the sun burns fiery red through the storm, we see the foundering ship in the middle
distance

It takes a moment to notice that in the foreground, the sea is choked with the drowning
victims, their their shackled limbs making any chance of survival impossible

Coming On), 1840
Turner’s picture recalls Géricault’s Raft of the Medusa in its treatment of a true story that
reveals unthinkable human depravity and injustice

Coming On), 1840
But it also invokes the theme of the sublime, in an image that shows humans as miniscule
and defenseless before the powerful and terrifying forces of nature

Romantic Landscape Painting

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